Chest compression is a life saving strategy for heart attack victims. It is estimated that every year roughly 300,000 people suffer cardiac arrest at home or in their community. When a heart goes into ventricular fibrillation it can no longer pump blood to vital organs. That is why cardiopulmonary resuscitation or CPR is so critical to survival. Many bystanders hesitate to perform CPR because they have also been told that mouth-to-mouth resuscitation is a necessary component to this procedure.
A new study shows that just pushing on the chest following the mantra, “push hard, push fast, don’t stop,” is better than old-fashioned CPR or nothing at all. A study out of Arizona tracked over 4,000 people who experienced heart attacks over a five year time span. The survival rate for no bystander involvement was 5.2 percent. 7.8 percent of those who got conventional CPR with mouth-to-mouth breathing survived to hospital discharge. Those who received chest compression only did best of all with 13.3 percent surviving to be discharged from the hospital. The take home message appears to be that if you suspect someone is having a heart attack immediately begin chest compression while someone calls an ambulance.
